Microsoft claims Surface Pro 3 sales are 'outpacing' earlier models

Microsoft's Chief Financial Officer Amy Hood said this week that sales of the company's 12-inch Surface Pro 3 tablet are "outpacing earlier versions of Surface Pro" but did not offer any specific numbers.

Hood made that rather general remark as part of the company's quarterly financial conference call with financial analysts on Tuesday, after it released its fiscal year 2014 fourth quarter results. Microsoft mentioned that the Surface division brought in $409 million in revenue during that quarter that ended June 30. The company has never offered any specific unit sales numbers for any of its Surface tablets.

Hood also mentioned the cancellation of another Surface product during her remarks Tuesday, stating, "During the quarter, we reassessed our product roadmap and decided not to ship a new form factor that was under development." It's almost certain that product was the Surface mini, the smaller tablet that was actually mentioned by name as part of the Surface Pro 3's official user manual.

What do you think about the news of the Surface Pro 3 out-selling the other two Surface Pro tablets at this stage of its life?

im not surprised if sales are higher than all pervious models especially when they annouced major companies and hotel groups adapting surface pro 3 its not only amazing hardware its amazing piece of art that need to be available around the world in order for everyone to enjoy it

"outpacing earlier models" is a pretty weak statement. If they had doubled or tripled the earlier models sales then they would have likely trumpeted that fact... And they really needed that kind of massive response in order to save the surface line.

Dont forget that the sp3 was only on sale for part of the reported quarter. Also, the cheapest model is not available yet. There are now 3 sp3 devices in my office. The reason started? It replaces the laptop and tablet.... Where did i hear that before?

Maybe there is still hope for the human gene pool? These devices can both play and work! You can do more than just watch dumb videos, half naked in your bean bag chair eating Doritos. Why waste your money on another tablet? My Surface Pro 2 is the only computer I need, and runs flawlessly!

Totally agree! I see so many people buying new ipads and new PC separately.. Or people carrying ipads and laptops everywhere they go... All because some dick told them to. It's mind blowing considering how many people can't research and think for themselves.

I used to sell these at the Microsoft store and people forget that the keyboard is practically just as good for productivity on the go as a laptop keyboard. And if you aren't on the go, you can dock it and make it into a workstation for the best productivity with no distractions. Thanks to USB 3.0 or BT the best keyboard/mouse is your keyboard or mouse when you have room and need that type of productivity. There are scenarios where the SP3 typing experience would be better than a MBA like in a lot of airport scenarios.

That's because they have finally gotten the form factor perfected. All the little tweaks have really made this the device to have. My office has now rolled out at least 5 of them on trial basis. We have had some issues with OneDrive repopulating due to network security, but from what my IT dept. Has said, MS is working closely with them to resolve the issue. Other than that, it has been successful and I am looking forward to a much broader rollout to replace our aging desktop pcs

I think it makes sense. For one, it didn't take exceedingly long from initial announcement to product beginning to ship, like plagued the Surface Pro 1. And the Surface Pro 3 was a more substantive upgrade over 2 than 2 was over 1. Also, the 3 didn't launch alongside a new RT device so didn't have to share the spotlight like the 1 and the 2 did.

Why release a surface Mini when they still have the Lumia line to fill that void. Surface is for productivity and Lumia is for consumer. It amazes me that people claim Microsoft products are expensive when the Surface costs less than the iPad and has far more features.

The Lumia 2520 has a damn sharp and very bright screen, great outdoors readabiloity and is pretty light and easy to hold and use as a mobile device. Plus the fact that it has built in support for LTE as well as Wifi just makes it that much better.

If only Microsoft pushed the Lumia Tablet line as much as it pushes the Surface - a lot of people would actually buy it if properly advertised.

I'm actually glad they ditched 16:9. I say by experience of the Surface Pro 3 that I personally prefer 3:2 much more. It makes the screen seem much bigger than an equivalent 16:9 one. Not to mention that 16:9 just seems to be squished out looking to me. I don't really know why 3:2 is so bad to some.

Same here. I am really enjoying the new form factor. If I had any complaint is my SP3 is not as durable as my old SP1. I dropped my SP1 on carpet several times with no ill effects. My SP3 dropped from about 2 foot inside a padded tablet bag and warped the chassis and popped out the screen. You can actaully very easily bend the SP3 so I am a lot more careful. Fortunately my Microsoft store agreed that it shouldn't have been so easy to break and replaced it.

The 16:9 form factor is one of the worst things that has ever been foisted on the general population. I guess if all you do is watch movies, fantastic. But people who want "a tablet that can replace your laptop" need to have more vertical realestate for Excel spreadsheets, lines of code, etc.

Those who like to read want a more natural (read: not super skinny) aspect ratio in Portrait mode.

The only thing that people who like 16:9 can scream about is "black bars!", which I was sick of hearing about when I had my iPad. I LOVE the aspect ratios that Apple and Microsoft have chosen, and think they are doing the right thing here.

I think they're targeting the right segment now, so there people they needed to gain the attention of are getting on board. The Pro is not a tablet, it's a PC in a tablet form and head always been. They need to keep showing more of what their hardware can do, and less of what the others can't.

Just don't let others tell you that Apple is the most integrated. I've seen people say how the iPhone and Mac are tightly integrated unlike Microsoft and then when they start to list off the integration features and say, yep, Windows has had that for quite some time.

Although Microsoft is horrible at marketing these, there are a ton of integration features between Microsoft devices. Of course you might already know that but I figure it is also good to say for others.

Yep, I have been consistently impressed with the level of integration in Microsoft services. Today, I sync'd up all of my external accounts much easier than I was able to even on my iPhone/Mac. I am loving this thing, though the app situation is the only wart on an otherwise beautiful experience. But that can be fixed, hopefully!

I'm a confessed Ford fanboy but Ford screwed it ip and not Microsoft. They only provide the basics but most of it was done by Ford. Same reason why i hate that Ford uses Sony stereos. They have all self sestructed in about 6 years. i pur in a Pioneer and the car and stereos works great after.

I like my Venue 8 Pro but after seeing the resolution on the SP3 and getting one, it just doesn't compete. I hope Dell makes a successor to the Venue 8 Pro with a higher resolution screen. Does yours get really hot on occassion?

I'm not surprised. By far the best implementation yet. I just wish there was a smaller, more affordable model, even if it runs RT. I need a small tablet with a great stylus. I'm looking at the vivo tab note 8, but the reviews give me pause.

Exactly, costly things will always sell less. Compare it to the MacBooks, great devices but the premium price makes it so they aren't everywhere and they shouldn't be everywhere! The same goes for the Surface Pro. As long as it is profitable it's fine.

What? This is false at its worst, and disingenuous at best. Have you ever used OSX? I do personally prefer windows 8 and windows in general as a consumer device, but being Unix based puts it leaps and bounds ahead of windows for many, many developer reasons.

They are a bit pricy though. SO is the surface pro line though. You get what you pay for - the quality on both products are great.*

@txDrum, "but being Unix based puts it leaps and bounds ahead of windows for many, many developer reasons"... That's it? Macs are definetly extremely limited and overpriced devices as Dare2Blink says. I mean obviously any developer can install Linux on any top of the line PC; being Unix would solve your claim. My (Hear this) Acer kicks my wife MacBookPro butt all the way; better procesor, more RAM, more HD, even battery, better graphics and a bit of a gimmick touch screen really! Better price! Still it works much better after 2 years with both! Yes, Acer, who would have know!

I would bet you money that your screen isn't as good. More pixels sure, but nobody except for Microsoft and occasionally Samsung match Apple's ability to factory calibrate a display.

I wasn't comparing OSX to Linux. But yes, Linux > windows for development UNLESS you're writing a c++/c# for sure or other Microsoft specific products (which is a lot of products for sure)

You haven't actually said what makes them limited. I wont buy one personally because they have no stylus and I need it for school. But that's not OSX specific, the surface is the only real quality device with the price range.

Even battery? I highly doubt you find a quad core device with as much battery life as the 15" rMBP. If so please cite, as I'd be interested.

Don't get me wrong man, I love and prefer windows. But I'm not biased into ignoring everything its competitors do better than it.

OSX is generally awful. I have to use imacs at work sometimes and it's like being back on Win95. Even people that have been using it for years fumble and struggle with it. Maximise should be full-screen, minimise should get it out of the way - not force them to drag out the window to full-screen. People accidentally click stuff on the desktop because there's no bg on some programs. Screenshots of file locations are easier than a direct link (people are always in awe when I can share a file link in 2 seconds on Windows) etc etc. I'm sure there's better ways to do all these things but 1) it shouldn't be so difficult and unintuitive in the first place; 2) I don't care :P

I had the absolute top of the line mac book pro (all the bells and whistles) but it was useless in the end, certainly when running Windows (Windows great, but performance was diabolical). Screen res was poor, too few keys, battery life bad. Ok, so this was 3 years ago and I know things have improved but still no touch screens (why oh why???) and still overpriced. I have searched high and low for a comparable device that matches the Surface Pro on price and spec and nothing quite hits the mark. Either the screen res is lower, or the touch screen is less responsive, or its bigger and heavier, or they keyboard feels clumsy, or the quality is inferior, or the battery life is less impressive, less ram, inferior processor. Whatever the difference, I think Surface Pro 3 is worth every penny. It's price lower for those who need less guts (more cloud duties) and is the flagship of Microsoft's ambitions for beautiful, practical, unified connected device and services for us all. Exciting times!

I did think like you but the boss tried the Pro 2 which is obviously the older model and after 2 months decided that the whole staff are getting the pro 2's and repalcing the macs. I was god smacked but know after 2 months after we had got them we have them docked at work but we take them home at night is the best thing I have ever got to experiance, not perfect but its just seamless to have both worlds. Not sure about the pro 3 but some staff are asking for the new one by salary scarfice a portion we are mostly agreeing that they are a good allrounder.

They are overpriced but I wouldn't say they're limited, even if they're rarely been cutting edge, spec-wise. However, I suspect they could put an Atom processor with 2 gig of RAM in it and it would still appeal to its existing market as long as it was shiny and had a nice glowing apple on the back.

I'm currently running Windows 8.1 Pro on my MacBook Pro. Running Windows on a Mac is a bad idea as Apple's driver support for Windows is pathetic, but I'm willing to live with it for now. From a internal point of view, it's nothing spectacular as you can buy the equivalent from many other vendors, however, the machine as a whole is unparalleled. The build quality of Apple's products are second to none. The way the aluminum is machined, the glass on the screen, the quality of the display, the feel of the keyboard and all those tiny bits, which when added together make the MacBook Pro the best notebook on the market.

I wouldn't buy another MacBook, purely because I'm a Windows user, however, I respect Apple's products and don't think that they're overpriced as pricing is all relative.

Here. Consider the revenue - surface pro made 500 million, Mac line made 4.5B if im not mistaken. That includes iMacsx2(21/27), Mac pros, MBP Retinax2, MBP x2, and MBP Airx2, while the surface has two, maaaaybe four models at a time. At worst, that's 9 SKUs to Two, at best 9to4. Considering the most expensive surface pricing is in line with Apple's cheapest "Mac" (MBA), the surface line doesn't do so badly I think.

The success of the DV8P is a reason they definitely should NOT have canned the Surface Mini. One tablet for the professional audience, and another for the casuals.

DV8P was awesome, but had some remarkable shortcomings.

A Surface Mini which takes the design language of the Surface RT, but with an 8in form factor and a price point of $199 would set the world on fire... and it'd be the perfect chance for them to integrate that 64bit Windows 8.1 experience the DV8P lacked, while being *just thick enough* for a full-size USB slot. They could keep the 1280x800 res though. Any more and they'd have to not only charge more, but ruin the experience with scaling.